14 June 2008

Well, we have just had a new addition to our quickly growing family. She arrived right on her due date (June 3) at 9:35pm. She was 7lbs 10oz and 19 1/2in long. It all started when Kellie started having really hard contractions for 3hrs at a time & then it would stop for a couple of days. One night (May 31) they were extra harsh. On the first, she thought that maybe her water was leaking, but maybe not! June 2nd she called her doctor & set up an appointment for early the 3rd to get checked. That night her contractions didn't stop & were really strong. At the doctor's office they decided not to check her & sent her off to the hospital. Knowing that they wouldn't let her eat & that it would take a while, they all decided to go search for a book & a snack. The gas station didn't have much but Safeway provided a moderately well done mystery & a Reese's. (Later Kellie decided that Paul's suggestion to go out to eat would have been better.)

Not very confident that the baby would come, Kellie sent Paul home with the kids to eat & take a nap while she had multiple tests done. After three tests they decided to keep Kellie. Her water was indeed BARELY leaking. But the contractions had slowed to four an hour. They had to wait for the doctor on call to decide what to do. After all, they don't like to use Pitocin on VBAC's. Kellie assured Paul that there would be plenty of time to have a nap with the boys & then take them to Cami's house before anything exciting would happen. 2nd mistake - 1st being the candy bar instead of meal. After a little while Dr. Chin came in to say that they would do a very low Pitocin drip to get her going. They inquired about when she'd want the epidural & she said that she could wait until dear hubby arrived (3rd mistake).

Reading her book & counting contractions, she noticed that she might be wanting her epidural & hubby soon. Therefore she called dear hubby to learn that they were awake but couldn't get a hold of Cami (awesome friend willing to watch kids while Gma Hansen busted her buns getting to Tucson by that night). Kellie sternly told them to go there & ring the doorbell, knowing full well that her friend was home & probably just not near the phone ( 1st non-mistake -Thanks Cami for being amazing!) and to get his rear to the hospital right away! Just before Paul got there Kellie hit the point where she had the nurse come in to tell her to breath because she wouldn't during contractions ( which were every 2 minutes & about a minute long). About 2 seconds after panicking Paul came in. The nurse- an amazing girl named Paula- said she'd add her to the list of epidurals & that she was about #3. So Paul bravely distracted Kellie as best as possible & forced her to breath while the contractions increased in strength. #3 is tougher than #1!

Finally, the epidural was in & working so Paul & Kellie resumed the book reading with the knowledge that she was only at a 5cm dilation. They were a little concerned that she wasn't dilating for a little while & trying to determine if they should add more Pitocin. 45 minutes after this discussion Kellie told Paul that something felt weird & to make sure that they told the nurse when she came in. 5 minutes later Kellie called the nurse in. The nurse thought that something was wrong with the epidural but wanted to check me first. 2 seconds later the nurse jumped back telling Kellie not to move or even sneeze because the baby was coming NOW! Within 10minutes Mercedes was born very purple ( because she came out too fast, she was bruised). It took a couple of hours before Kellie got over the fact that she was out because she didn't expect a baby for hours.So, that went well. The boys love her and we're enjoying family helping out. We'll see how we do when all the family's gone! Love you all!